Marc Marquez analysis: How does he compare to Valentino Rossi and Casey Stoner?

Heading into the summer break following a fifth 37-point weekend in succession, Marc Marquez finally admitted something many in the paddock have long thought already in 2025: this is now his championship to lose.

After 12 rounds, the factory Ducati rider is 120 points clear in the MotoGP standings having amassed eight grand prix wins and 11 sprint successes, with just two of those 12 events not featuring him on a Sunday podium.

The step in form Marquez has shown in 2025 on the GP25 harks back to his Honda domination days, but is arguably more impressive given the fact he is now 32 and is coming off the back of a serious arm injury in 2020 and years of ensuing recovery.

But it has also coincided with a field not really able to hold a candle to him. Alex Marquez did a fine job in the early part of the campaign on his year-old Gresini Ducati and even led the standings on two occasions. But the expected multiple grand prix wins haven’t come, while Pecco Bagnaia’s form has dramatically fallen away as he continues to be unable to adapt to the GP25.

Marc Marquez, by no stretch, has had it easy. But his rivals picked a bad year to make mistakes given how good the 32-year-old has actually been this season.

There are still 10 races to go, but safe estimates suggest round 18 in Indonesia on 3-5 October will be the weekend where Marquez is coronated for a seventh time in the premier class - matching Valentino Rossi’s tally set back in 2009.

Scoring at average of 31.75 points per weekend compared to 21.75 for nearest title rival Alex Marquez, it’s likely (if that continues) then Marc Marquez could celebrate his first Ducati championship in Honda’s backyard at Motegi. If he manages to score 103 points more than Alex Marquez over the next four rounds - which will be no small task - he could even wrap up the championship at Misano in mid-September.

Whenever he celebrates the 2025 title, it will go down in history as one of the best seasons ever. But how does it compare to other dominant campaigns in the modern era?

How Marquez’s 2025 stacks up against past dominant years

Marquez’s tally in 2025 is hugely impressive, especially given how much more closed up the field is in MotoGP in general now and the fact he has 22 extra races to contend with every season with the sprints on top of the traditional grands prix.

Unsurprisingly, his current campaign brings to mind his most dominant championship to date in 2019 - so far his most recent world title. In that year, on the factory Honda, Marquez won 12 times and led the standings at the end of the year by 151 points. That’s the biggest winning margin of any rider in the modern era. He also only finished off the podium once.

What was impressive particularly about that campaign was the fact that the Honda wasn’t really capable of that. There were only three other HRC podiums that season, all of which from LCR’s Cal Crutchlow. Only Marquez from the Japanese marque won on the bike.

He took a total of 88.4% of the available points up for grabs that year. Currently he has 85.8% of the points available in 2025, albeit after 12 rounds compared to 19 in 2019.

His 2018 was similarly dominant, though he was 76 points clear in the championship with nine wins and four of the 18 rounds without a podium. Prior to that, his 2014 campaign saw him win a record 13 times but only have a 67-point lead in the standings at the end of the season. He also failed to get onto the podium just four times out of 18 rounds.

Before Marquez dominance became a staple of MotoGP in the 2010s, you have to go back to 2011 to see a similar display. Also on a factory Honda, Casey Stoner romped to his second world title with a 90-point championship advantage and 10 wins, with just one race in 17 not featuring him on the podium.

In 2007 he was even more dominant on the factory Ducati, winning the championship by 125 points with 10 wins. Jorge Lorenzo’s 2010 was one of MotoGP’s more dominant years, with the Yamaha rider 138 points clear in the championship with nine wins. Team-mate Valentino Rossi won nine races on his way to a 93-point lead in the standings in 2008. On both occasions, the pair were off the podium just twice.

Unsurprisingly, dominance and Valentino Rossi are two terms that go together nicely. In 2002, the first of the modern MotoGP era, he took his factory Honda to 11 wins and a 140-point lead in the standings. In 2003, he won by 80 points with nine victories, but managed to finish on the podium in every single grand prix, giving him a whopping 89.25% of the points available from 16 rounds.

His 2005 title goes toe-to-toe with Marquez’s 2019 in the current race for the best ever. Rossi utterly dominated on the factory Yamaha, taking 11 wins and podiums in 16 of the 17 rounds to celebrate the title 147 points clear of everyone else.

Who had the best machinery?

Ranking the best season ever in MotoGP is a hard one to truly quantify. Arguably, there is a case to make for two eventualities: one where you go head-to-head with a brutal rival and just come out on top, or the other where you are so in control it’s borderline embarrassing for everyone else.

But, MotoGP title fights in the modern era have actually seldom been down-to-the-wire affairs. The 2022-2024 battles went to the final round, but before that only in 2017, 2015, 2013 and 2006.

Such has been the talent of the absolute best in MotoGP in the 21st Century that most of them at some point have been totally dominant. But ranking pure dominance is almost impossible because there are always differing factors at play.

All of the seasons listed in the table above saw no more than three wins by others from the manufacturer of the rider who won barring 2003. In 2014, Marquez was pretty unstoppable but team-mate Dani Pedrosa spent much of the year suffering from arm pump. In 2011, Stoner’s team-mate Pedrosa also had injury woes, while Andrea Dovizioso wasn’t good enough to be winning races on the factory Honda.

In 2010, Lorenzo’s title charge was made somewhat easier by team-mate Rossi breaking his leg mid-season, while Honda’s Dani Pedrosa also had his own injury woes. The same is true of 2008, with a rookie Lorenzo fast but mistake prone.

Rossi’s early years of dominance on the RC211V did come on the grid’s best bike. But the quality of his rivals wasn’t as good as it was later in his career. Five wins did go the way of other Honda riders in 2003, highlighting the strength of the RC211V and four-time 2003 winner Sete Gibernau's ability to sometimes bother Rossi in the early 2000s.

No Yamaha rider won other than Rossi in 2005, but the M1 of those years is considered one of the best bikes ever. Yamaha’s stable outside of Rossi wasn’t necessarily as strong as his Honda stablemates were, with just three podiums being celebrated by an M1 that wasn’t the Italian’s. Those were scored by Colin Edwards, who ended that year 188 points behind in the championship.

In 2007, Casey Stoner definitely didn’t have the best bike. He was dominant on the Ducati, yes, but it won just once outside of his 10 victories. Last year, he recalled that the GP7 “wasn’t really good at anything”. Stoner was also pretty unfancied then as someone capable of that level of domination, after a fast but crash-prone debut on the LCR Honda in 2006.

In many ways, 2019 for Marquez and 2007 for Stoner are the most comparable seasons where one rider has been out of reach in the championship. There are a few things that put 2019 a little ahead, though. For starters, the competitiveness of the 2019 grid was much better than in 2007: Marquez found himself on the losing end of battles at Mugello, Austria and Silverstone that year, and was run close elsewhere.

He scored almost 8% more points over the campaign in 2019 than Stoner did in 2007, which can be attributed to Marquez being off the podium once and Stoner four times. And as mentioned already, the Honda shouldn’t have been capable of that: Marquez was able to ride around the problems, much like Stoner was on the Ducati.

So, to have ended up 151 points clear through all of that is incredible.

The question of best bike in 2025 is slightly tricky to answer. The GP25 arguably isn’t the best thing Ducati has put on track recently. It has only won once outside of Marquez’s hands, and Pecco Bagnaia’s Austin victory was a direct result of his team-mate crashing from a dominant lead.

The GP24, in theory, is a better bike. But Alex Marquez has only taken that to one grand prix win and one sprint victory. Ducati has also only been beaten twice: once in the wet at Le Mans by Honda and by Aprilia at an odd Silverstone race.

But, just like he did in 2019, Marc Marquez is just riding around the problems the bike has - something Bagnaia has repeatedly admitted he simply cannot do. In terms of what bike was worse, the 2019 Honda still keeps that year as Marquez’s best for now.

However, if he continues what he has already done this year, then it will be hard not consider 2025 as his greatest season - and the best year ever for a rider in the modern era.